Pisces Women, so true...and so me. *edited for reading quality, last attempt, I promise*

trying to invent something!" "I-I'm a little girl," said Alice, rather doubtfully.

She found herself at last in a beautiful garden, among the bright flower-beds and the cool fountains.

The line forms to the right. And please don't crowd. There may not be enough Pisces women for every man, but that's no reason to be unruly. You'll have to take your turn, and hope for the best.

Even without astrology, rumors have spread about the charms of a Pisces female. She has her negative points, to be sure, but at first glance she's every man's grade school valentine, with maybe just a touch of a Playboy bunny to add some pepper. We might as well admit that the modern, emancipated woman, with her cast-iron image, has made the Pisces girl's value shoot even higher. With all that free­dom from the feminine mystique clouding the air over lover's lane, the demure, pretty, helpless Neptune creature has to beat off the men with big sticks.

It's hardly surprising that she's at a premium. The Neptune female seldom tries to overshadow her man, mar­ried or single. She hasn't the slightest hidden, neurotic desire to dominate him in any way. He can pull out her chair, put on her coat, whistle for the taxi, light her cigarette and talk about how wonderful he is to his heart's content. All she wants is that he should protect her and care for her. She's happily content to lean on his big broad shoulder and let him know, with wide-eyed wonder, how strong he is, and how much she needs him in this scary world. Just think of all those wolves out there, waiting to devour Red Riding Hoods. It's enough to make a girl get out her smelling salts. Even if she isn't quite as Victorian as all that (though plenty of girl fish are), she'll be a charm­ing listener to all his troubles, and what is referred to as a good egg through every crisis.

A Pisces woman thinks her mate, lover, boy friend, brother, father-in fact, any man-can lick the whole world with one hand tied behind his back, and it takes a surprisingly small amount of her touching faith to con­vince them of the same thing, men being the way they are. And you wonder why she's so popular? The Pisces girl is a cozy, calm haven of tranquility for her proud male, far from the noise of the frame and the ticker tape machines. The lights in her fish pond are soft and dim. They soothe tired eyes which have been blasted by neon and all those silly little figures at the stock market she couldn't understand to save her life. (Though if it would really save her life, she would sharpen her pencil.)

In the winter she wears fluffy angora mittens. In the Spring she wears dainty, full skirts. Summers will find her in a brief bikini. In the fall she'll look adorable sitting be­side you at football games, with her hands in your pockets to keep them warm, and asking you the score. She is eter­nally feminine in all seasons. At the risk of making an un­derstatement, men are drawn to her like bumblebees to a honey pot.

A short conversation with her, and a man instantly re­laxes. He pictures a glowing, crackling fire on a chilly night, or he sees himself in a hammock on a balmy spring day, with no one to nag him. She makes it clear that she'll never blame him for any problems in his career or any ac­cidental mistakes. It's always someone else's fault. Not her man's. Shell never press him to get ahead faster. His own pace is perfect with her. Need I explain why the female fish makes the most dangerous other woman of all the Sun signs? Flash! Maritime warning: After marriage she may nudge a little. To be truthful, she may nudge a lot. In a way, it serves you right for letting yourself be so blinded by her charms. Lots of times she'll even be bitterly sarcastic, but every woman has to have some flaws, and the Pisces girl will be gentle far more often than she's quarrelsome. She has to be goaded by extreme cruelty or laziness in a mate to be a shrew-and who's to say a cruel or lazy hus­band doesn't deserve it? Not me. I'm with her.

Besides, her delectable femininity covers any minor defi­ciencies, and most of the time the typical Neptune girl is soft, dreamy and womanly. Since the fish swims in both directions at once, she adapts beautifully and quietly to conflicting situations that would turn other women into nervous Nellies. Of course, now and then, some cranky words and irritable chatter may bubble up from her nor­mally placid stream of thought. Occasionally a sensitive Neptune female who has suffered harsh treatment at an early age will allow bitterness to break the two symbolic fish of her sign apart-and this can be very sad. She be­comes a lonely, miserable Piscean, always swimming furi­ously, and meeting herself everywhere she dives down to escape-never realizing that the turning inward of her end­less love and sympathy toward herself is the real poison. Drugs and drink and false illusions hide the truth from her and blind her to the rocks in the river that might destroy her. But the average Neputune girl keeps both symbolic fish joined firmly together in smooth action, gliding softly first back, then a little forward, so you're never quite sure exactly which way she's headed. Pisces is said to be a deep, mysterious sea, into which all rivers flow. You'll have a better chance of catching her if you know some of her elusive secrets. What makes her swim?

First of all, she's subtle. Ask Nicky Hilton, Michael Wilding, Eddie Fisher and Richard Burton-each of whom married a Pisces. As a matter of fact, the same Pisces. She is not only subtle, she's sometimes a bit deceptive when she practices her art of wrapping you around her emerald ear­rings.

Now, you may know a Neptune lady who wears a ging­ham apron and a shy smile, and who is the epitome of the devoted wife, homemaker and tender mother. You're think­ing that she's neither subtle nor deceptive. Forgive my di­rectness, but you are wrong. As for that Pisces lady you think is different, I know her, too, or one just like her.

She's a widow who lives in the Bronx, and her name is Pauline. She also wears a gingham apron and a shy smile -the whole setup. How can such a Fannie Farmer image be subtle or deceptive? I'll tell you. First of all, she wraps everyone around her apron strings. (She doesn't have any emerald earrings. Next year, maybe.) She's a short woman who has managed to stand up to the loss of a dear child, heartbreak, boredom, tragedy, fear, poverty, and even the confusion of sudden, very brief riches. She's coped with little boys' bruised knees, braces, lost galoshes; a husband's sloppy Sunday cook-ins in her neat kitchen-and the big­gest mixture of in-laws-all speaking eight languages at once-you ever saw outside the United Nations. She has faced all this mishmash of fate like Rocky Graziano. That's gentle? That's delicate? To this very moment, her two sons think of her as a charming, girlish, helpless, fluttery and soft little creature, who needs to be protected, and who can't quite understand how the lock works on the front door.

She's delightfully vague and dreamy. She doesn't know a thing about economics, but she manages to dress as though she was turned out by Sophie of Saks, cook frequent seven-course dinners for assorted grandchildren, pay the rent on time, and send exquisite gifts on holidays and birthdays- all on a monthly income about the size of one of Jack Benny's tips. She has the open love and affection of two daughters-in-law, and an incongruous group made up of the librarian, the super, the owner of the comer delly, the fruit man, half a dozen stray cats and children, the butcher, the newsboy, and would you believe it, even the landlord. She may have one enemy. The man she turned down before she married her husband. He probably joined the Foreign Legion in disappointment, and now I doubt if she even re­members his name. Heartless females, these Pisces women. Subtle and deceptive. (But don't try to tell their neighbors that.)

Like the March winds, your Pisces girl will have many a mood. She's terribly sentimental, and when her feelings are wounded she can cry buckets. She'll look at you so re­proachfully you'll feel as if you'd just shot a small rabbit. Pisces females sometimes get the idea they're hopelessly unequipped for the fierce battles and driving ambition re­quired to survive. Then deep depression sets in. At these times you'll have to tell her she's admired for her deep, mysterious wisdom and her blessed understanding by every single human she has ever graced with her friendship. It's usually the gospel truth. The hardest lesson she has to learn is to overcome her timidity and her doubts. If the fears go deep, she'll shut herself off from others, then wonder why she's lonely. She's often afraid of imposing, pushing too hard, taking advantage, when such thoughts are in no one's head but hers.

Now and then a Pisces girl will cover her shyness and vulnerability with wisecracks, a sophisticated veneer and a frigid independent personality, but it's merely a cloak of protection, worn to hide her uncertainty from the prying eyes of rough people who would bruise her genfle heart if she exposed it. I know one who pours out her real soul by writing lovely song lyrics with a secret message woven in the shades of her soft, very private dreams. When she's not writing, she's the picture of the brittle, callous, career woman she wants people to see. Yet, even this type of Pisces is unable to fight her Sun sign. With all her make-believe independence she waits on the curb and lets the man whistle for the cab. There are some things one just doesn't do, as far as Neptune women are concerned; not acting like a lady in public is one of them. She fools a lot of men who could quiet her inner fears and make her take back her frequent claim of, "Who needs a husband? They only mess up your life." Imagine a statement like that from a Piscean, who needs to belong to someone more than she needs to sleep, eat or breathe.

A Pisces girl will give all of her heart to her children, except for the large chunk she saves for you. She'll love them all, but the ones who are uglier, weaker, smaller or sicker may have a slight edge with her. Only a Pisces movie star would pass up the little dimpled darlings and adopt a tiny, crippled tot with frightened eyes. Female fish are the greatest women in the world for understanding the shyness of small boys and the growing pains of awkward adolescent girls. A Piscean mother spins a thousand wispy, cobweb dreams over each bassinet. She'll sacrifice anything so her children can have what she was denied as a child. She may be too permissive. Administering discipline is difficult for her, and she must realize that a lack of firmness is often as bad as severe neglect. In a way, it is neglect, of building the small characters in her care, who need firm guidance to leam to swim alone. If she's guilty of too much softness, explain it to her kindly. She'll comprehend without bitter­ness, and begin to give the hairbrush a workout. Still many Neptune mothers manage a happy medium between dis­cipline and kindness, and their offspring do them credit.

A Pisces woman will gladly let you cam the bacon and cggplant. She'll probably prefer not to enter the brutal com­petition of the commercial world, unless you desperately need her to. She had enough of that (if she's a typical Neptune girl) when she worked for that big, confusing company while she was waiting for you to rescue her. Some, not all, but some Pisces women are a wee little bit extrav­agant. She may need some help figuring out why the bank's balance doesn't reconcile with her stubs, written in Sanskrit. Still, when an emergency forces her to adapt her champagne taste to a skim milk pocketbook, she'll man­age.

She listens to the ocean, and it tells her things. In the> midst of the city, she still hears the waves of Neptune whispering to her Pisces heart more, perhaps, than she wants to know. Don't forget her birthday or your anni­versary or the day you proposed. She won't. I'll always remember the Pisces friend I went to school with in West Virginia. She was tiny, with long, dark hair and those strange Neptune lights in her greenish brown eyes. She mar­ried (among several other men) a big football star; it was a totally unexpected elopement. I remember when she asked him why he proposed. She was curious. "Well," he told her, "it was the funniest thing, Shorty. I didn't have the slightest idea of proposing that day. We were in the park, near the pool. The chicks who were lying around getting a tan had wet, stringy hair from swimming, and they looked all hot and sweaty on the benches. You were sitting there under that tree in a white lace dress, and you looked so cool and different from the others. You looked like-well, I guess you sorta looked like a girl." That's the subtle secret of the Pisces woman. Whether she follows Neptune's call as a dedicated nun in a convent or as a sultry songstress in a noisy nightclub-she's a girl. All girl. One hundred per­cent.

Butterfly Layouts>